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What I give form to in daylight is only one percent of what I’ve seen in darkness.

–M.C. Escher
(quoted in Gardner, Martin. The Colossal Book of Mathematics W.W. Norton & Company. New York (2001). p. 212)

And of course I can’t quote Escher without playing Escher’s World:

Lyrics by Steve Taylor:

Through the passing strange I fell
To the wide-eyed opposite
My agenda was hidden well
Now I don’t know where I left it

I woke up in Escher’s World today
My mother said it was okay

Up’s down, down is out, out is in
Stairways circle back to where you’ve been
Time falls, water crawls, are you listening?

Did you ever chase your tail
Through a maze of exit doors?
I have seen the light by Braille
I have blazed the road before us

We’re walking in Escher’s World again
Rise up you nimble-minded men

Birds roar, lions soar, sheep are cruel
Snails pace, papers chase, midgets rule
Stuffed shirts, status hurts, we ain’t foolin’
We ain’t foolin’, we ain’t foolin’.

Let the sequels have their day
Yeah, the remake’s on its way

We’re living in Escher’s world it seems
We’re wide awake within our dreams

Socks hop, lemons drop, butter flies
Tough wimps, sado-shrimps, mojos rise
Pips squeak, widows peek, are you surprised?

Oh, living in Escher’s world, oh.

We’re living in Escher’s world it seems
We’re wide awake within our dreams

Birds roar, lions soar, sheep are cruel
Snails pace, papers chase, midgets rule
Stuffed shirts, Ethel Mertz, we ain’t fooling

Socks hop, lemons drop, butter flies
Tough wimps, sado-shrimps, mojos rise
Pips squeak, widows peek, are you surprised?

Up’s down, down is out, out is in
Time falls, water crawls, are you listening?
|: Stairways circle back to where you’ve been :|

Don’t let the title of this post fool you; I’m actually only going to say a really short thing. Given my previous post, which deals with Einstein’s Relativity, I thought it would be interesting to pass on something I once read, I believe in one of Brain Green’s books (i.e. The Fabric of the Cosmos or The Elegant Universe). However, it might have also been in Genius by James Gleick. Don’t quote me on it, but it went like this:

Relativity is counter-intuitive and doesn’t make sense at first. But it obeys the rules and once you figure them out, you can train yourself to make sense of it. Quantum Mechanics, on the other hand, is not only counter-intuitive, but you can’t train yourself to make sense of it either.

And of course I could throw in the comment usually attribuited to Niels Bohr: “If you think you’ve understood Quantum Mechanics, you haven’t understood it.” (Of course I’ve heard variations on this quote too; but this is my favorite version of it.)

How is it possible for someone to suddenly scream, “LAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!” in a high-pitched opera voice and think it’s anything other than annoying?

Yet a certain person does it all the time here at work. Grrrr.

Mike Straka, where are you?

This weekend, I picked up Mass Effect which, as the name implies, is a Roman Catholic science project.

Just kidding. Naturally, it’s a video game. When I got it, the salesman told me that it was a game like Halo. I almost didn’t get it for that reason (Halo 2 impressed me so much I still haven’t bought Halo 3, if you catch my drift). However, I decided to go ahead and pick it up, and it’s a good thing I did because Mass Effect is pretty much nothing like Halo.

In fact, if I had paid attention I would have seen that Mass Effect was a BioWare production. And if I had seen that, that fact alone would have told me it was worth getting this game. BioWare sold me when I played Neverwinter Nights, and even their Jade Empire was cool (although too short). But the game that they’ve done that Mass Effect is most like is Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic.

The great thing about BioWare games is that they’re true RPGs. That is, you actually have a story. Halo was just a glorified dungeon hack ‘n slash (you get dropped in a dungeon–even they want to call them “levels” now–and fight your way out with no real plot). Mass Effect actually plays more like you’re in control of a movie.

Of course a lot of this happens at the beginning, and you’re thinking “I bought a game to play not to watch movies” but eventually you do get to go around blasting aliens to little pieces. From that point on, the cinematics usually occur where you want to see them. Of course I haven’t finished the game yet, but thus far it seems balanced between game time and story progression.

All told, if it says BioWare on it it’s almost certainly going to be a great game, and Mass Effect is no exception.

John McCain is the Republican’s Jimmy Carter.

Liberalism: The dreaded feeling that somehow, someway, it’s Bush’s fault.

I know it doesn’t seem like it, but this is a serious question. This morning, I looked up into the sky and saw the crescent moon overhead. I remember a few weeks ago the moon was in the sky in the morning too, but it was a full moon then. So, here’s my question:

Since the phases of the moon are caused by the angle of sunlight and the location of the moon, how is it possible for the moon to be in the sky at the same time as the sun and have it be a full moon one time and a crescent moon the other time?

(BTW: I’m have a theory on this that I’m pretty sure about, but I figured I’d throw it out here and see if anyone else cares about it first.) :-)

As I got home, I started thinking…today is the last day of January.

Already 1/12 of 2008 is over.

My how time does fly faster and faster the older one gets. Seems like just yesterday I graduated from high school (it’s been more than 11 years now though!).

The old saying is true: Youth is wasted on the young.

I’m currently reading through The Nine Tailors by Dorothy L. Sayers. My father got me the book for Christmas and warned me that the first 100 pages or so are somewhat boring since you have to establish the necessary background for the mystery to work. So I’m in the midst of that section now, but I did find this quote which I thought was too good not to pass on:

“I assure your lordship that for the first time in my existence I regret that I have made no practical study of campanology.”

This is followed up with: “I am always so delighted to find that there are things you cannot do” which is likewise clever, yet not relevant to my point…which is that you will actually be saying “I regret that I have made no practical study of campanology” as you read the book too…

If we have a whoever, whatever, however, wherever, and whenever…

WHY DON’T WE HAVE A WHYEVER?